Father’s Day

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We spent just an overnight, working only a bit, over Father’s day weekend on the farm.  Just another run of photos, and only for the first day and a half, as the battery went dead on the camera.

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The first two picture are just showing the fruit set on the two apple trees near the old homestead site.  The latter had good eating apples last year, while the first had no fruit on it at all, but I pruned it heavily while it was still dormant earlier this year, and it has a good set of fruit I hope hold until maturity.  We will see how they taste.  They have a reddish cast to them already.  The tree in the second picture also has a slight blush, but not as deep as the first.

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Patti and Nell got a hammock set up.

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Patti had an idea for a weather proof table that was cheap to put together and could be used as a food prep surface.  The solution was a $10 set of plastic saw horses, two $5 closet shelf pieces, and zip ties.  Worked great.  Might make a few more.

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I did more work with the weed wacker than anything else.  I made a path back to the main berry patch we had found the previous weekend.  IMG_8340 IMG_8341

Cleared out a bit around the plants hoping to encourage their spreading more.

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Some research on the internet when we got back told us these are not raspberries, but instead blackberries, which is fine, but surprised me a bit as blackberries cannot take the cold that raspberries can.  Indicative, I suppose, of how this truly is a solid zone 5 area even though it is well north of where I live now.

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Just a shot of one of the Mount Royal Plums leafing out nicely.

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And Patti walking up to where I am checking out the trees.

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Flowers that the kids gathered.

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Patti took the camera and went for a stomp around the property.  This is a shot on the north side, looking east out over the 10 acre field up there which will be a future project to work on, and for now is wildflowers and uneven ground.

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From the north side looking south.

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Far north west side, near the tree line, looking east again. IMG_8362

Patti found clumps of berry plants here and there.  Told me she found a dozen other patches.

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There is still water in the woods, and a wonderful chorus of frogs in the evening and night hours.

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North east corner looking southwest to the center.

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Same shot, just zoomed in on Nell a couple hundred yards away.

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This is back at the center of the property, with Phoebe running up the driveway.  One of the other projects I did, was to weed wack the whole thing down.  Does are hiding fawns in the tall grass.  Don’t need to roll one hiding as we drive in.

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Not a real clear night for stars, and not an in-focus picture, but a nice full moon through the windmill.

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Next morning Claire and were up early, and made a coffee run into Cornucopia.  Took a road called Sisquit Falls and found why it was called that.

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For whatever reason, violet making her grumpy cat face while relaxing in the hammock when Claire and I got back.

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Bacon and eggs on bagels for breakfast.  Lots of bacon.  After city prices, you go a little overboard with bacon only costing $2.50 a pound.  We ate over 3 pounds between us at a single meal.

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Kids enjoyed the hammock.  Don’t think it is rated for someone my size.

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Got to working on the hops.  Don’t have any photos of it all cleaned up (we got rid of all the weeds around the windmill) as the camera did not last until the end of the day.

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I tied all of the long pipes in securely.

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Then ran baling twine down to the plants.

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Bugs got to be a bit much for Claire and Violet so they retreated for a bit.

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And it also got hot.  And humid.  At noon we headed up to the lake and took a swimming break.

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And with that, the camera was dead.  Patti and I put in another 4 hours working on the property, and we headed home.  It was an interesting drive, running into a huge set of thunderstorms which accompanied us, and slowed us down.  We got home around midnight, I got to sleep a bit after 1 am, and then it was off to work this morning.  The storms broke the heat and we had a beautiful day here.  I replaced a few tomato plants in the yard I had lost to unknown causes, did some weeding, Patti put in a small brick patio, we had a nice venison stew loaded with fresh garlic scapes from the garden, and it is time to head to bed again, now that I have finished picking ticks off of the dog.  Not sure if we will make it up right away again this coming weekend.  But we will see.

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